dave's day

barondave told me about this. There's a chain of barbecue restaurants called Famous Dave's, and once a year they hold Dave's Day, when anyone named Dave can get a meal up to $15 free. You have to bring in a photo ID proving that you're Dave (or David, which most Daves are).

Well, OK. I generally prefer that people not call me Dave,¹ but for $15 worth of barbecue, I'm willing to sell my nominal integrity. The problem is that there are no Famous Dave's around here. Well, there is one sort of vaguely within driving distance if I can think of an excuse to go in that direction which I mostly can't, and last time there was a Dave's Day that one wasn't even participating, but this year they are. So I drove there and told them I was Dave.

Actually, I was expecting the place to be packed, the way the local Denny's were when they had a big breakfast discount one day recently, or like the Red-Headed League in the Sherlock Holmes story. Only with Daves, instead of red-headed men or people who like Denny's. And I would go from table to table and query to test my theory that most men named Dave, at least those around my age, have brothers named Mike.

But in fact it wasn't crowded at all, and it was pretty much like any other sit-down coffee-shop style chain restaurant with a Texas theme, except that I got $15 off my bill. Naturally I left a tip based on the full price.

And the barbecue was ... not bad, considering that there isn't too much in the way of good barbecue around here.² I got a combo plate, and found the pulled pork best, the ribs merely edible. The sides, often the weak spot even at better bbq joints than this, were especially good. You don't get a lot of bbq for your money - unless it's Dave's Day, in which case you get a thundering lot for your money - but I might return even on other days.

Now, what else to do around there to justify the trip?

1. My brother sometimes does, but he has a childhood exemption, and when I'm leaving my name with the clerk at a fast-food restaurant for my order to be called, I generally give it as Dave, because I have this mental image that guys named Dave eat at fast-food restaurants, while guys named David don't.

2. There used to be a joint in Santa Clara with the tenderest, juiciest ribs ... I can still taste them. Like every place else in Santa Clara, it's long since turned into a Korean restaurant, but I gaze at it every time I pass by, hoping it will have miraculously reverted. No luck so far, but I keep hoping.